


Just another regular day

by Wandererzaehler



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-11-01
Packaged: 2018-07-10 08:07:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 5,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6974863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wandererzaehler/pseuds/Wandererzaehler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of drabbles and short stories about the Librarians and their adventurous lives in and around the Library. Contains magic, fluff, nonsense, Evlynn and lots of jasmine tea. Hope you enjoy! //Also on ff.net</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Yet Another One

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own The Librarians or profit from this story.

**Yet another one**

Eve kicked the thing again. It fell down to the ground and produced some sort of strange, hollow groan.

Meanwhile Flynn was bending over the sarcophagus and tried to decipher the hieroglyphs. Every once in a while he scribbled a few lines in his notebook, muttering inaudible things.

„I've got it!“, he finally exclaimed and closed the book, grinning widely at his guardian.

„The first good news today“, she snapped, „you know, I start to hate mummies. Why does it have to be mummies? Always?“

„I like them, actually“, Flynn said, putting the book in his bag, and watched her trying to break away from yet another bandaged, undead something.

„I know“, Eve said, slamming the mummy against the ancient wall.  
The mummy's grip on the guardian's waist slowly loosened. So did its bandages. A foul stench of decay filled the air and Eve miserably tried not to tangle herself in the stinking mass while getting away from the mummy.

„Eve“, the Librarian said in a strained voice, „do you remember the way out of here?“

„No. Don't tell me that we're...“

„Nah. Never. I'm just...checking. We'll get out of here....“

„Great“, Eve murmured gloomily. She knew exactly what would follow.

„...Eventually”, Flynn added.


	2. Gruff

They were intruders, delaying his research and always asking him questions. They ruined the quiet and perfect silence established in the Annex over all these years.

So at first, all he wanted was for them to be gone, so that he could get back his peace.

But, over the months they spent together, the old man grew very fond of them all, without exception.

Still, he would never, ever admit that he liked having company, liked having friends again after many years of seclusion.

The phone rang. Jenkins answered it with a gruff, harsh voice, but actually he was smiling.


	3. Outrunning

He had known that he was straining his luck, sneaking around in Jenkins' Laboratory, but he couldn't get this shiny artifact out of his head which the old man had taken away from him.

And now, Ezekiel Jones was running as fast as he could so that Jenkins would not get him.

He had seemed really angry, considering that Jones had only broken some dumb, old cup standing half-hidden on Jenkins' desk.

Afterward, the thief stopped pretending that he could “outrun everything” and mostly kept his mouth shut when in Jenkins' presence.

At least, he did for a little while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess I watched BBCs Merlin too many times... :D


	4. Invasion

The Annex was a mess. Books were all over the floor and loose pages lay everywhere. The lamps on the table had fallen over, one of them had gone out.

Eve stood at the Back Door, staring with a stern look at the Librarian, who was leaning against the table.

“I leave you alone for a few hours and you manage to do... this!” Lost for more words, she just made a vague gesture to the whole of the Annex.

Flynn gave her his best innocent smile, hoping it would calm her down.

“What happened?”, Eve finally managed to say.

“Well... you know, er... We had a bit of trouble. Nothing we couldn't...”

“Flynn! It's coming your way!”

The Librarian immediately reacted. He grabbed a bucket that had been standing on the table, hurried over to the door connecting the Annex and the Library and stood there, bucket raised high like a weapon, and waited. When something small whooshed past him, he pulled the bucket over it, trapping whatever it was.

Stone, Jones and Cassandra stormed into the Annex, trying to regain their breath. Jenkins followed shortly after.

“What happened?” Eve asked again with a baffled look.

“Someone”, Flynn looked meaningful at Jones, “managed to leave the door open, so that something could come in.”

“What?”, Eve snapped, worried.

“Don't freak, Eve! This was the last one, I promise”, Flynn said, nervously looking up at his Guardian. 

“It's rats, Colonel”, Jenkins said.

Eve, who had had her hand on her weapon, relaxed: “I thought someone had breached the Library, trying to cause the end of the world. Again.”, she laughed, “But as long as it is just rats...”

“Told you”, Jones whispered to Stone, “she's not afraid of rats.”

Flynn, who had trouble holding the bucket down, murmured: “Yep, only rats. An invasion of small, non-furred, squeaking, spying cyborg-rats. Nothing we couldn't handle ourselves. Just your average Thursday, right?” 

Eve stared at him for a few seconds, then she couldn't help herself anymore and burst out laughing.


	5. Quiet

He never really noticed it until he started working at the Library. Wherever he was, there was always something nagging at him, unnerving him. It wasn't that bad in the rural areas, but when he moved to town it was always there. The noise. Everywhere. People talking and fighting, dogs barking, traffic, sometimes even music was too much for him. All these things got stuck in his head, giving him a headache and a vague feeling that he was missing something. Sometimes he had trouble sleeping because even his thoughts seemed to be too loud.

He realized it when he arrived as the first at the library one day. It was quiet there. 

Imagining that the noise had to stay outside was a comforting thought.

This was the reason why now Jacob Stone always was the first one in the Library (apart from Jenkins, who obviously lived there). He cherished these first few minutes he had to himself, in perfect quiet, before a new day really began, with all the life-threatening action and saving-the-world kind of stuff. Today he had about fifteen minutes before Baird would arrive, always the second and absolutely punctual. 

Stone grabbed one of the art portfolios and started reading.


	6. Rebellion

Eve Baird knew exactly how many steps she would need to make until she reached the Annex, but she counted them anyway. After all, the Library had changed drastically before and she did not intend to get lost in it – not again. It had happened, once, and it had taken Flynn and Jenkins a long time to find her, astray in the ancient pot section.

When she reached the Annex, the now well-known smell of Jasmine tea greeted her from the small kitchen next door. Baird preferred coffee, but Jenkins refused to make some for her. He kept saying that tea was a lot better for waking her up than caffeine was.

Eve didn't want to insult the old man, so she drank one cup of tea every morning. But before she drove to the Library, she always bought coffee to go and drank it on her way there. She felt like a teenager rebelling against the rules an adult had set and she enjoyed it, maybe more than she should. It was her little secret. Not even Flynn knew about this ritual.

Baird entered the Annex, wished Stone good morning and went straight to the Clippings Book.


	7. Like an old, married couple

“Jake, will you just...”

“I will continue doing it this way anyway, no matter what Math you come up with.”

“But you'll be so much faster if you just – “

“End of discussion, Cassandra! I mean it.”

Jenkins sighed. He'd listened to these two quarrelling for some time now, and it really was time they got a new dish-washer, so Cassandra and Stone stopped bickering like an old, married couple over how much (if any) time Jake could save by changing his dish-washing-routine.

And, as it just so happened, a new dish-washer would both save time and Jenkin's precious tea-cups.

* * *

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This one is for my brother who turned 18 today (sniff) - I'm sure you can relate to this story as much as I can! To defy adulthood a bit longer (believe me, it's not that amazing once you can't get out of it again...) - a Librarians' quote for our treasure hunt:
> 
> “You see the blue wire?”  
> “Yeah!”  
> “Don't touch the blue wire.”  
> “Gah! Start with don't. Start with don't!”
> 
> Happy Birthday, JCGenius!
> 
> And thanks for reading, guys, as always! :D


	8. Compromises

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just adding all the Drabbles that were already online on Fanfiction.net so AO3 is updated :D

He followed the same sequence every morning. Jenkins had made himself tea for as long as he could remember. While the tea pots and cups changed as well as his favorite flavor (not to mention languages, clothes, people and, over all, times) this was something he could actually hold on to. He had forgotten some stretches of his long life, not all of them involuntarily, but this helped him remember the important things. 

As he had started to like his coworkers, he began making them tea every morning, too. He had bound them into his ritual, so he would not forget the time he spend with them. 

As he entered the Annex, Stone and the Colonel were already present. 

Contrary to Baird's belief, his nose still operated exceedingly well. Of course he could smell that she always bought coffee before she came here. But Jenkins liked how she tried to find a compromise between them, so he never told her about it.

He poured three cups, took his to the desk and settled himself in a chair. While he slowly sipped his hot Jasmine tea, the Back Door, set to Germany, suddenly burst open and Flynn stumbled into the Annex.


	9. Much obliged

Flynn had an almost perfect morning. He had obtained the object in question and was now on his way back to the Library. The artifact did not look dangerous in the least, being a rusty watering pot, but it had almost erased the whole village. 

It wasn't far to his way out, but the villagers were closing in. It would take a while for the curse to wear off completely and until then they didn't like to have their cult object removed.

In the nick of time he reached the bathroom door and stepped through to the Library, accompanied by the usual wobbly feeling.

“Grüß Gott!”, he laughed.

Jenkins was the first to recover from his sudden entrance and his weaving with the watering pot of doom. “Tea?”, he asked.

“Oh, yes. Much obliged.” 

Flynn placed the object on the desk, careful not to pour even a drop of water, and then turned to Eve, who eyed him carefully. 

“Hi there”, he said and smirked, “back alive once more.”

“I can see that”, she said straight-faced, but Flynn could see the smile she was suppressing in her eyes.

Not caring the others to see it, he walked over and kissed her.


	10. Preserving Image

Jones stopped the car and checked his face in the rear-view mirror one more time. He grinned at his reflection and ruffled through his hair once more, making himself look even more roguish. Then he left the car.

Whistling a jaunty tune he walked over to the Library, arriving just in time to see Flynn pulling Eve close and kissing her. 

Ezekiel stood in the door frame and watched the couple for a few moments. He actually considered being nice, this once, and not saying something nasty about them... But then again, he was Ezekiel Jones, world-class master thief, and he had to preserve the image they had of him. Still, he gave them a few more seconds before he interrupted, just because he was in a good mood.

“Aren't you finished yet?”, he asked, grinning smugly, “I thought we were here to work.”

Baird pulled away from the Librarian as soon as she heard Jones' voice and gave him a dirty look.

The thief almost felt sorry when he saw the disappointment in Flynn's face, but shrugged it off, literally, and went over to the table, where he grabbed the watering pot: “What is this ugly thing doing here?”


	11. Magical

Cassandra was doing math. She stood before the door to the Library, surrounded by white lines, equations and notes, all of them connected. She had been thinking about the ley lines on her way to work, and now she couldn't just shake her thoughts on this topic. She had always had the feeling that there was something she had not yet considered about these lines. It had been nagging on her ever since they defeated Prospero.

She stopped, confused, as the first raindrop hit her forehead, then tried to resume her thought. The first drop was followed by another, then one more and within moments a heavy downpour came from the sky.

Cassandra hurried inside, seeking shelter, but, to her immense surprise, the rainfall continued uninterrupted, even though she was in the Library. With a very bad feeling she hastened to the Annex, drenched with cold water and chilled to the bone within a few seconds.

There were puddles of water on the floor, getting bigger. She remembered Eve telling her something about an artifact Flynn was after that had to do with water. 

On days like these, Cassie almost wished that the relics weren't that magical after all.


	12. Cursing

When Cassandra entered the Annex, confusion reigned. Ezekiel stood by the table, a rusty watering pot, presumably the artifact Flynn had been looking for, in his hands, laughing madly as he poured its content all over the clippings book. 

Flynn stood halfway between him and Eve, a furious look on his normally smiling face. He had obviously been trying to stop Jones from whatever he was doing, protecting Eve, which was, as Cassandra thought about it, not the way it usually worked between them. As the redhead hurried closer she saw, to her immense surprise, that the Librarian was frozen like a statue, mid-step, and that he was completely dry. Eve, a meter behind him, was the same, petrified with a shocked expression on her face, just as Jenkins, just as Stone. None of them moved. Cassandra couldn't even see them breathing. 

And in the middle of all this, still pouring water, stood Ezekiel and laughed and whooped. It was one of the most horrible scenes Cassandra could remember since she started to work at the Library, not because of what it looked like, but because it felt so very surreal, creepy. 

A cold shiver went down her spine as she tried to carefully get closer to Jones, who hadn't noticed her yet. Finally, when she was almost able to touch him, the thief looked at her, but seemed to have problems to focus at her face. He looked this way and that, avoiding her eyes, while he kept doing whatever it was he did with the magic artifact in his hand. 

“Ezekiel”, she said, trying to give her voice a steady sound, “it's me, Cassandra. What are you doing?”

“I did nothing”, he said, looking guilty, and stopped his crazy laughing. 

Somehow Cassandra was sure that he was not in control of what he was doing, maybe not even aware that he had done anything at all.

“What is this?”, she asked, pointing to the watering pot.

Jones looked at it like he had never seen it before and, visibly trying to shake it's hold on him, he shook his head: “I have no idea”, he said and tried to set it back down on the table, but the pot suddenly seemed to be incredibly heavy, because Jones dropped to his knees with a surprised look.

“Can't you just let go of it?”, Cassandra suggested.

“It feels like my hands are glued to the handle, I can't loosen them. Not even an inch.”

The rain got worse with every minute and Cassie was sure that she heard thunder rumble in the distance. It sounded like a big storm was coming. A storm. In the Library. Full of books. Books made of paper – she stopped her thoughts right there, trying to focus on the situation on hand rather than thinking about what it might cause.

“Flynn brought it here, didn't he?”, she asked and suddenly remembered what Eve had told her about the artifact.

It had been in the possession of an old lady somewhere in a village in Germany, who used it to 'help the weather along', as Eve had phrased it. Without it, the village would long have been drowned in heavy rains or storms which were common there because the land on which the village was built had been cursed by a really pissed-off sorcerer. 

The watering pot had been handed down from one generation to the next, used to catch the storms when they were still more or less harmless, and storing them inside. But, unfortunately, the curse and the pot became linked over the years, so that the one influenced the other and the weather got worse with every use of the pot, almost overflowing with magical contents. 

When the old lady died without heirs, people hadn't known what to with the rusty watering pot because none of them knew what it did. To stop the demolition of the village due to the villagers lack of knowledge, the clippings book had sent Flynn in to retrieve the pot and, because of the close link to the curse, remove both of them to the library for save storing. 

Obviously Flynn had not been able to secure it before Jones had let loose the collected storms of a few hundred years, that now began to start in earnest with heavy wind and hail, making it hard to talk to each other.

“He did!”, Ezekiel shouted, fighting to get away from the pot.

“He must have touched it and nothing happened to him!” Cassandra hurried over to the frozen Librarian. His hands were bare, but the could see a thick looking pair of gloves tucked away in his right trouser pocket. She pulled them out, put them on and returned to Jones. The water had risen to her knees, so she couldn't even see the handle of the pot anymore. Kneeling down besides the thief, shivering because of the cold, she tried to find the handle in the dirty water. Finally, she did and as soon as the gloves touched it, Jones fell backward into the water. He came back out, coughing and spluttering, just in time to see Cassandra straightening the pot.

The rain stopped immediately and the water on the floor retreated back into the pot.

Flynn, now unfrozen, staggered against the table, turned around and saw that Cassandra and Jones had already stopped the almost-drowning of the Library. He smiled at Cassandra: “Good work!”, then grimaced and rubbed his right hip with which he had run into the table.

“Ouch”, he commented drily.

Most of the water had returned to the watering pot, but not all of it. Luckily, most of the books were on high shelves or on the second floor in the Annex and had not gotten really wet, but the clippings book did not have that much luck. 

The others had long gone home, when Jones was close to finish with his work. Because it had been his fault, starting to pour the water and all that, he was the one who had to clean up the mess now, using an empty bucket and a mop, and then a hairdryer for the clippings book.

Jenkins was the only one who had stayed with him, not to help, but to monitor if he did it right. Jones, even though feeling guilty about what happened, had of course heavily objected to doing all the work, but no one had wanted to help him in the end. 

Jenkins knew, just as well as Flynn did, that there were artifacts in the Library that they could have used to dry off the Annex much faster, but they had decided to leave Jones in the dark on this one for now. Neither one of them had liked to be frozen for almost half an hour before Cassandra had freed them. 

 

Jenkins had been smirking the entire time while sitting at the table with crossed arms and whistling a tune to himself. He would tell Jones when he was done with the book and then use the artifacts to dry off the rest of the them. But until then, he enjoyed watching the tired, cursing thief with the immense hairdryer in his hand, bent over the wet book.


	13. Memories

Flynn had spent the last few hours imprisoned in a cellar, without proper food, sunlight or something to do, driving him almost crazy until Eve had finally found him. They had managed to finish with their business quickly after and decided to stay for a couple more hours and try to forget about it.

Taking this tour had been Eve's idea and Flynn, feeling really relieved and just happy to do anything, agreed to go.

So now they were in a gondola, at the Grand Canal. The gondolier had stopped giving his usual tourist information as soon as he realized that Flynn probably knew more about Venice than he did.

But when it got dark the Librarian stopped talking and stared onto the water, his face expressionless. 

Eve was so used to his constant talking that she found his silence more than just disquieting: “What is it?”, she asked worriedly.

Instead of telling her, Flynn took her hand in his own. Finally he managed to say: “It's just bad memories. It'll pass.”

Eve reached out and lightly touched his cheek. He kissed her in answer and she felt how much he needed it. When they finally parted, both gasping for breath, he pointed to some old-looking building on the side and told her about the family that had lived in it long ago and had hoarded magical objects, most of them in the Library by now.

He seemed to be his old self again, but he kept hold of Eve's hand for the rest of the tour like his life depended on it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I figured that Flynn would be reminded of himself and Simone while being in a gondola. There was this very similar boat-thingy in the third movie... Does anyone remember this except me? I wasn't sure, so I thought maybe I should give some explanation before people get all confused! I hope you liked it!


	14. Stuffed Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set after Season 1, episode 5.

After his fight with Jones it happened again. All the memories were popping back up, everything he had stuffed away in the farthest places in his mind became present. He would never get used to this, though it happened with an increasing frequency.

Whenever this occured, the books in the Library, all the magical artifacts and even the people he was now working with, were not enough to keep his mind off of the stretches of his past reappearing before his eyes. 

He remembered places he had been, things he had done, but, most of all, he remembered people. He remembered distantly how they laughed and smiled, how they had looked when they were sad, battles they had fought alongside each other, things they had said to him, and things he never had a chance to tell them. 

But the strongest feeling connected to them always was that of loss. 

They had all died long ago, and the good memories tied to them tended to get weaker with every day that passed, while the bad ones got stronger. 

Flynn, Baird, Cassandra, Jones and Stone would also become mere memories, names connected with a bitter feeling of loneliness. 

He would be the one who would live longer than any of them. He would watch them die, presumably sooner than later, and he would be last man standing again. 

As always.


	15. Up and Down (Part 1)

The minutes were ticking by ever so slowly. By now Flynn knew that he should have gone with Eve. But when she had offered to take him with her, he had said he would be okay on his own. 

So here he was, definitely not okay, and waited anxiously for her to return.

He started to fidget around on his seat, taking out his watch again and again, only to realize that the more he looked, the slower the time crawled by. 

He could not believe that he, a Librarian!, had forgotten to take a book with him. Honestly, how did that happen? 

To occupy himself, he started to talk aloud to himself. His voice sounded hollow and surreal and only added to his feeling of discomfort, so he stopped talking, only to feel the silence weighting heavily on him. 

Where he was sitting, he couldn't even see people passing by, no matter how much he turned his head and body around at weird angles. 

He climbed from his shotgun-position to the back seat and then back again to the front. Counting up to thirty, he gave it another shot, faster this time. Then he counted to sixty-three and repeated his move, again a bit faster than before. When he climbed back to the front, he hit his head on the rear-view mirror and spent the next few minutes probing his head for blood, recalling symptoms of concussion, feeling sorry for himself.

To make matters worse, Eve's car was absolutely clean. There were no things lying around like in his, no books stuffed under the seats, no jelly beans in the glove compartment, no candy wrappings to fold into paper-planes, simply nothing. 

He undid his tie and rearranged it around his head, like he did on sword-fight lessons with Excalibur. 

Then he decided that Eve might be back every second and that he was looking ridiculous, so he rearranged it around his neck. Then he remembered that he had his tie around his brow the first time they met and, if he remembered correctly, she had instantly been very partial to him, so he knotted the tie to the side of his head again in the hope of making her laugh.

Finally, he couldn't hold it in any longer and, while waving his hands around in the air and bouncing up and down on his seat, screamed: „I AM BORED!“

TBC


	16. Up and Down (Part 2)

When Eve reached the car and saw that it was still in one piece, she breathed a sigh of relief.

Whenever she left Flynn alone, she somehow expected something bad would happen. It wasn't that he messed up whatever he touched (this happened only occasionally, anyway...), but he seemed to be a magnet for trouble. It would find him, and it would find him almost every time when she wasn't there to help him. 

So when she got back to the car, she felt relieved. At least now she would be there to protect him.

But when she slid onto the driver's seat, Flynn wasn't sitting shotgun, greeting her with his big smile. She experienced a moment of horror.

But then she heard someone snoring on the back seat. It was the Librarian, his bare feet propped up against one window, shoes on the floor, his head against the window on the opposite side. He was using his jacket as a pillow. Even though the posture looked uncomfortable, he was sound asleep, snoring, his eyes moving rapidly behind his eyelids. 

Eve looked him up and down and felt this special, prickling, bubbling feeling surface inside her, the one she only got when she was with him. 

His tie had slid down from where it had presumably sitting before and now covered one of his ears and part of his left eye. He looked ridiculous, but it remembered Eve of their first meeting and she started to grin.

When Flynn opened his eyes, Eve was sitting on the driver's seat, looking back at him. She was smiling widely, her eyes shining, a slight blush creeping over her cheeks. He grinned back at her and thought that she was the most beautiful thing he had seen all day long.


	17. Shadows

Once every year, always around October, Jenkins was very busy. 

The first year the LITs were working in the Library and it happened, Cassandra believed it to be a poltergeist, because it occurred in all of the rooms in a really creepy way, complete with flickers and, after that, with total darkness.

This was the month most of the lamps in the Library started to burn out and Jenkins had to replace them. He worked methodically, from one room to the next, careful not to forget even one small bulb.

He knew that shadows in a Library could get dangerous...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any Whovians around? Otherwise... this is probably not that funny :D
> 
> By the way: I spent a year working at a Library and can tell you that really all of the bulbs burned out at the same time. I had just started the first series of 'Supernatural', so I was looking out carefully for any poltergeist-signs... :D


	18. Puzzling

“Maybe we should start over again?”, she suggested.

“No! We're so close! It can’t be that hard. Look, it says here: Age 10 +. I can do this, just watch me!”

“But...”

“No, I'm sure it fits right there somewhere. Look, Eve, the one up there has the same colour.”

She eyed the spot Flynn was pointing to, but couldn't agree with him. 

Eve sighed and stopped arguing. This was definitely going to be a long night.

Flynn had a determined expression on his face and held a small puzzle piece in his hand, staring at a half-finished jigsaw puzzle.


	19. Magic Blade

He remembered Excalibur hanging like a normal sword from Arthur's belt, springing into action only when the King wielded it, nothing more than a normal blade then.

Whenever Excalibur and Jenkins happened to run into each other (or whatever one might call their meetings), the sword soared away from the former knight as quickly as possible, like it was hiding something.

But maybe, Jenkins mused, it was something different. Maybe Excalibur was feeling guilty about not being able to defend the King against its evil twin, Clarent – or maybe the magic blade missed Arthur just as much as Galahad did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Researching for my Merlin fanfiction I found a name for Mordred's sword: Clarent, originally one of the Arthur's own swords, later abused by his son to kill him (depending on which legend one builds one's story). 
> 
> I'm so happy Excalibur is back on the show! Really missed the sword! 
> 
> Though I really have no idea why people thought creating a sword moving on its own accord, displaying emotions and causing wounds that cannot be healed was a good idea. Imagine what would happen if it experienced a mid-life crisis... Well, just a thought.


	20. Familiar Feeling

Flynn always had lots and lots of books with him wherever he went. Even when they were on a mission, he was sure to have at least one hidden away in his satchel somewhere (and usually it was the one which provided the solution). Eve was so used to seeing him with many-paged ledgers and old, worn leather volumes she sometimes didn't even think about the books anymore.

But one evening, while she was waiting for whatever Flynn was trying to cook for her in the kitchen, she found a book in one of his shelves which intrigued her enough to open it and page it through.

She leaved through it once, then another time, and then once more, slower and slower each time in growing wonder.

She barely noticed when Flynn entered the living room and, seeing her with this book in hand, coming to an abrupt halt.

"What is this?", Eve asked and raised an eyebrow in what she hoped to be a mocking way, though she wasn't sure if it understated her uneasiness enough.

"I'm pretty sure you know the title", the Librarian answered, and then smiled slightly.

"'The Holy Bible'? I never took you for the religious type, Flynn."

"I'm not", he said, and this time his smile was a bit sad, "that is, I'm not anymore."

Eve opened the book again, this time on the title page. To Flynn. Love, Dad.

"Oh, Flynn, I –"

"You didn't know."

He walked over to his Guardian and she handed the book over to him, warily watching his every move. She knew how much the loss of his father was weighing on him still, maybe even more so since he found out who murdered him.

Flynn flipped the page over and smiled vaguely: "This was always one of my favourite stories, and one of my favourite pictures in the book."

Eve leaned closer to have a look at the rather crude sketch of a woman, a tree, and a snake.

"Though", Flynn added, "we all know the fruit given to Eve was not an apple. They always get that detail wrong. You should think people painting for a children's version of the bible would do their research more thoroughly..." His babbling ceased while he stared at the page with a thoughtful expression. He traced the woman's face with his index finger and shrugged: "It's strange, you know. Every time I open this book, it feels like... it's become so familiar over the years. When I open it, I feel like I'm... home. And safe. The pages even smell that way."   
Laughing shakily, he added: "Ridiculous, isn't it?"

Eve lightly kissed his cheek: "Not at all, Flynn. This book may be old and worn..."

"Actually half of the pages are loose. Never came round to fixing it."

"... but it is your connection to your past, and to your father. Its important. I understand."  
There was a long moment of silence, and then Flynn nodded and returned the book to the shelf before asking: "So, how about dinner?"

"Sounds amazing. Lead on, Librarian."

Flynn smiled, grabbed Eve's hand, squeezed it thankfully, and together they left the room.


	21. Button

“Look, Eve!”

Eve looked up from her desk and, on seeing the Librarian approach with a big grin, she raised a questioning eyebrow: “What?”

“Here, look at this.”  
Beaming proudly, Flynn pointed to a button on his vest: “This one became loose while I had to run from a bunch of somewhat annoyed priests and had to squeeze through a narrow passage.”

“Why were you...?”

“Not the point – I've actually sewed on the button while still wearing my vest!”

Eve blinked in irritation: “And?”

“Still wearing the vest”, he repeated, “and while I was running.”

“Ah.”

“In the dark.”

“Ah.”

* * *

 

TBC in “Should've thought of that”


	22. Should've thought about that

Flynn was in a very good mood for the rest of the day. He talked even more than usual, and Eve caught him staring at her more times than she was used to (not that she was complaining).

His mood changed drastically, though, when he and Eve were back home and he had gone to the bathroom to take a quick shower. His curses were audible even in the kitchen, so Eve, ever the Guardian, decided to make sure he was okay.

He was, though he looked slightly more ridiculous than usual being half in and half out of his vest, which seemed to be somehow stuck to his shirt. He had his back to Eve and was unaware of her presence, so he continued to rant about vests and shirts and the combination of both in general, which made it all too easy for someone with certain capabilities and some enthusiasm to sew the both of them together while trying to fix a loose button when being on the run: “I should've thought about that!”, he hissed while trying to pull both vest and shirt over his head at the same time.

Eve decided she had heard enough.

She opened a drawer and pulled out a pair of scissors while having a hard time not to laugh at his flushed face: “You forgot _in the dark_ , Flynn.”


End file.
